topsoil

I've seen my fair share of disappointing qualifiers in the World Cup in the four team version. A lot of times you had two teams of a higher standard than the other two. The run off and final meetings should be better whatever format you use.

I dare anybody to use the word tedium after the passes by Howe, Doolan and especially Summers tonight

Some excellent racing tonight, the passes by Howe, Doolan and Summers in particular were superb. Agree with you the Summers move in heat 13 as good as I have seen at Berwick in a long time. It came after a nice move by Aarnio off the second bend to pass him in the first place. The rule which affected Covatti was brought in this season, to stop tactical moves to have races stoppped when the opposition are on a 5-1. In my opinion it is a good rule, too many times I have seen potential 5-1's overturned in a re-run. Tough on Covatti maybe, but he was well behind in the original race. I can also sympathise with the Wilkinson / Wethers incident. Wethers was legitimately injured. I want to see four riders in a race. It was explained afterwards that is the only way a rider originally replaced could be re-stated. All in all some very encouraging signs for Berwick tonight. A big turnaround from the Tyne Tweed meeting. The track also looked the best it has this season as well.

So what you're asking for is even more fixtures that you may choose to stay away from and the BSPA to arrange the fixturee list around your Summer holidays :-)

Bandits riders will have to gate better than they did in the Tyne Tweed Trophy meeting. Newcastle won comfortably that night. Not having Ashley Morris at reserve takes an ace card away from Newcastle for me, but Matty Wethers is very capable around Shielfield. Two evenly matched teams, I can see another tight one, lots of former Bandits and Shielfield specialists in the Newcastle line up. Hopefully decent weather tomorrow and a good following up from Newcastle to add to the atmosphere.

Funny how everybody lauds the Polish leagues, we should be following their example, blah blah blah. They only have seven home fixtures each over there. Is it killing the sport over there, the lack of continuity, only one home fixture every two weeks at the best?

Sorry, got you now. Hard to tell on here with the amount of whining that goes on.

Why? I can understand it when England games are on, but not for the rest of the fixtures.

This certainly doesn't apply to Berwick where all the home riders go into the crowd after a meeting and have photos taken with and speak to the fans, the kids love it.

Even cricket authorities are looking at shortening Twenty20 matches now to 100 ball innings.

Excellent win against an albeit depleted Ipswich team. Would the score have been different had King and Covatti been here? Who knows, but a win is a win. Probably just echoing the thoughts of everybody above, Schlein was in a class of his own. Outgated once, by Summers, all night, but easily found a way past. Ben Barker is brilliant to watch at Berwick, much the same as Bomber, never gives up. I was impressed with Hartel, he got better as the meeting went on and picked up a heat win. Berwick were strength in depth personified with the two reserves almost top scoring. Good nights for Summers and Doolan. Glad to see Paul Starke getting up from the tangle which shot him into the fence at a funny rate, although his bike looked worse for wear, that would be an expensive crash. Would like to see David Howe getting into the points. Not had the best of starts after a brilliant comeback last season. Maybe he will be the next one to spend a bit of time in the reserves. It seemed to work for John Lindman last night. Good to see him with a good score last night and get his confidence up.

Think it has more to do with Berwick being consistently inconsistent. Berwick are like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get.

He's got something anyway

Isn't this the first sign of madness, when you argue with yourself?

Two teams, two nights, two draws. Ebbed and flowed this one. Workington ahead early, until two 5-1's and a 4-2 in heats 8 to 10 saw Berwick in the driving seat. Then a questionable decision (to exclude Jakobsen) and a shocking decision (to exclude Etheridge) brought Workington back into it. Not a great night for racing, which on the whole was a bit strung out. Not sure if you could blame the track for this one. Last week you could see riders trying to pass, but there was little drive to help them. Tonight it wasn't as if riders were in a position to try to pass. I'm all for giving somebody time, but unless there is an improvement, John Lindman must be on thin ice. Berwick can't afford any passengers. Ty Proctor probably the best rider on show tonight. Dany Gappmaier made a few great starts. Just need a bit more consistency from Berwick riders.

Cracking racing last night.

Predicted 41-49 and happy to be proved wrong. How different it would have been with Ostergaard fit who knows. Great boost for Berwick though. Doolan was superb, looked very fast all night. Really need to do something about the 3-4 pairing, which looks vulnerable. Impressed with Ben Morley for Lakeside, better than I remembered at Shielfield. Always good to see Bomber riding round here, non-stop racer. And good to see Nick Morris back as well. On a totally separate note, there was some absolutely cracking races in the NJL match, a couple of good battles between Keiron Douglas and Josh Embleton, then Sam McGurk, Luke Harrison and Archie Freeman had three really great struggles, riding way beyond their years.

I'll put my head above the parapet and say 41-49 with Ostergaard riding now. Lakeside top end will prove the difference.

Morris, Lawson, Ostergaard and Newman, Berwick up against it tomorrow night. Need everybody to step their game up to get anything from this.

Summed it up in one word there, gating. When the track is as slick as last night, gating is paramount. You could see Summers, NBJ, Howe all searching for drive round the banking, but nothing there. Hopefully next week the track will have a bit more grip on it, like the Glasgow meeting, because, if not, I fear for another defeat with Lakeside here.

What a difference a week makes. Staggered at how we can beat Glasgow one week and get thoroughly beaten by Newcastle the next. Track was ultra slick tonight and when you add getting regularly outgated it spells trouble. Couple of really good races tonight, Doolan and Wilkinson, NBJ and Wethers, passing and re-passing, Summers with a couple of nice passes, other than that it was from the gate. As brilliant as Captain Kev was last week, he was poor tonight. Very impressive comeback from Matty Wethers, given that he didn't get a team place last season. Hope there is more grip next week or they really need to sort the gating out. On the plus side, another big crowd tonight, plenty of visitors, nice weather and meeting run at a decent pace, given a rider replacement.

Nice little touch as well, to introduce the juniors to the crowd during the interval. It gives them exposure to the crowd, a little boost for them and fills the time in as well. Good to see Leon riding last night. There were a few youngsters round where I was going daft because he was racing. It just shows you the potential pulling power of having local riders in the team, who are identifiable and and who the fans can relate to and how important the training track is to all this.

21 if you stayed to watch the juniors

You've basically said everything I was going to say. Great meeting, some superb racing, Harris amazing moves, big travelling support, close meeting, juniors racing afterwards, in other words a great advert for the sport. What I would give to see Chris Harris racing here every week. A pure racer.

Good news and another feather in the cap for the promotion. It was great when the club hosted FIM and Ben Fund meetings. This might not be on the same scale but still a meeting to look forward to.